Editorial: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/4173678.htmlJames deAndaThe late lawyer and former
judge worked quietly to end discrimination against Hispanics in Texas.

Aristotle argues that all virtue can be summed up in
dealing justly. By that measure, the late James deAnda was among the most
virtuous of Texans.

DeAnda, who died Thursday at 81, worked quietly for
half a century to extend justice to all Texans. As University of Houston law
professor Michael Olivas told the Chronicle, deAnda was for Hispanics what
Thurgood Marshall was for black Americans.

DeAnda's work was not directly related to but closely
coincided with the famous Brown v. Board of Education that outlawed racial
segregation in the public schools. DeAnda was a member of the team of
lawyers that filed the appeal that ended the official and systematic
exclusion of Hispanics from Texas juries. He filed lawsuits that ended the
segregation of Hispanics in South Texas school districts and other
disgraceful treatment that denied them equal opportunity to quality public
education.

Appointed to the federal district bench in 1979 by
President Jimmy Carter, deAnda was only the second Hispanic federal judge in
Texas. He was also the last Hispanic judge appointed for the heavily
Hispanic Southern District of Texas.

DeAnda's work, largely conducted out of the
limelight, is not finished. In 1983 deAnda sentenced a former sheriff and
two deputies to prison for torturing confessions out of prisoners. The
nation finds itself embroiled today in a debate over whether terrorist
suspects can be legally and morally mistreated and abused.

Michael Solar, deAnda's law partner when the latter
left the judiciary, said the former judge was "never rancorous, but always
demonstrated a great deal of understanding and desire to work for the common
good."

Can there be a better role model in an age when
justice and fortune still fall so unevenly in our society?